Nature's Folly
by Fluffy-ashke
Summary: The STNJ is assigned to investigate some unusual goingson in a house that brings back bad? memories for Amon. POSTSERIES AxOC Skipped to Ch. 7 due to plot hole
1. Prequel: Salvation from the Dark

_Prequel: Salvation in the Dark_

_Robin awoke with a sneeze. She hurt all over, and everything was pitch black. Making a small flame for light, she carefully sat up. She was in a tiny, dusty room, with no apparent windows or doors, but for an odd looking, rough tunnel in one of the walls. The ceiling was so high she could not see it, though with the musty scent of the room, it had to be there. There was rubble all around. Next to her lay Amon, still unconscious. He was covered with blood!_

_Looking down at herself, Robin realized that she was bloody as well, and on the floor was a great pool of blood, surely enough that they should both be dead. Examining him closely, she saw that beneath all the blood and torn clothing, Amon had nothing more than some fresh scars. But how was that possible? They must have fallen from above, because the tunnel had no bloody trail in it, but for a set of prints in the dust, made by bare human feet._

_Amon opened his eyes slowly, adjusting to the dim light cast by a tiny, floating flame. He rolled over and stood, carefully walking to Robin, who was standing nearby._

_"What is this place?" He asked her. She shook her head, not looking at him._

_"I don't know. I guess we're still somewhere in the Factory. This tunnel wasn't made by a machine. Look at the rough edges. And what are the marks on the wall? They look like claws. Big claws." She shuddered._

_"Well, it looks like there's only one way out, and we don't have a choice, really. We take the tunnel, or…" Amon's stomach chose that moment to growl loudly, and Robin's answered. She fell into a fit of hysterical giggles, amazed to be alive. Amon scowled, and started along the tunnel. "I'd rather not starve to death."_


	2. Chapter 1: Haunted

POST-SERIES

Amon and Robin somehow escape from the Factory, under very strange circumstances. But then, some of Amon's past begins to come out as a mysterious witch, called the Angel, falls into the STN-J's crosshairs...

Nature's Folly

WARNING: POST-SERIES

((NOTE: I do NOT own Witch Hunter Robin, or any characters from it. I'm not making a profit off this, so don't sue me. Lastly, if any of the religious or sexual topics (If you want me to be specific (which would spoil quite a bit of the story) email me.) involved in this insult you, don't send me hate mail. This is called ART, children, and therefore I am free to make it as I see fit. Any suggestions, please send to and please state the subject, or it might be deleted. Thankees much! Fluffy-sama))

Chapter 1: Haunted

_Two months later, STN-J Headquarters_

Dojima sat next to Robin in the briefing room, swinging her legs and being bored in general. She kept an eye on the girl and her partner, noticing that since the Factory incident, they were much more at ease with each other. Apparently some of their issues had been resolved.

The whole organization had changed drastically. Without the Factory and the orbo being in use, their methods had changed from capture to kill, which gave them a bit more freedom, but sometimes made things difficult. They no longer went after all witches, instead only ones that were causing trouble, acting suspicious, or the ones that had grown too powerful and posed a threat. Robin no longer felt so guilty about her own powers, understanding that what she was doing would save lives, of normal people and witches alike. Also, Amon's half-brother Nagira had joined up with them, on an unofficial level. He wanted to protect witches, but to do so he also needed to make sure they were behaving and not running around killing people.

Michael came in, and sat with the others to give them the info on their latest target. He no longer wore the tracking device, having "done his time", as Headquarters put it. After a moment to retrieve the data, he looked up at the group.

"Okay, this one's a bit strange. We have no picture data, official files, or anything. All we've got is an address, and some reports from informants." He sighed and leaned back. "There seems to be some odd activities happening in this place, stuff like music in the middle of the night. For whatever reason, this house was under surveillance beforehand, but if a reason was ever given for that, the information has been cleared. Anyway, witch powers were detected, we're supposed to go check it out, kill anything inside, and not take chances. Nothing's supposed to be there in the first place, and there's no water or electricity. We're also warned to be careful, keep an eye out for traps. Any questions?" Everyone shook their heads.

Everyone, except for Amon, who was staring at the address on the screen, and a very pale Nagira, who was staring at Amon.

"What's wrong, guys?" asked Sakaki. "You look like you've seen a ghost!"

"Maybe we have…" murmured Nagira. Amon suddenly stood and walked out of the room, not saying a word. "You see, he used to… well, we used to know the family who lived there. But they all died ten years ago…"


	3. Chapter 2: Questions

POST-SERIES

Amon and Robin somehow escape from the Factory, under very strange circumstances. But then, some of Amon's past begins to come out as a mysterious witch, called the Angel, falls into the STN-J's crosshairs...

Nature's Folly

WARNING: POST-SERIES

((NOTE: I do NOT own Witch Hunter Robin, or any characters from it. I'm not making a profit off this, so don't sue me. Lastly, if any of the religious or sexual topics (If you want me to be specific (which would spoil quite a bit of the story) email me.) involved in this insult you, don't send me hate mail. This is called ART, children, and therefore I am free to make it as I see fit. Any suggestions, please send to and please state the subject, or it might be deleted. Thankees much! Fluffy-sama))

Chapter 2: Questions

"Okay, so why is Amon acting all weird about it then? Nothing else has ever really seemed to bother him." Dojima scratched her head as she frowned at Nagira. The others all watched him expectantly, but for Miho, who was still looking out the door where Amon had hurried out a moment before. She had sensed a flood of conflicting emotions all around him, and none of them were happy.

Nagira sighed and scrubbed his hands over his face. "I don't know how much I should tell you guys about this, so I guess I'll just not name names." He closed his eyes briefly, gathering his thoughts. "Until about ten years ago, there was this family that lived in that house. There was a mother, and her two children. Twins, really; a boy and a girl. They were complete opposites, but exactly the same at the same time. The girl was so beautiful, and she loved music. She played her piano whenever she could. Had she wanted to, she could have gotten rich off her musical talents. She sang, played, wrote, and simply lived for music. Everyone loved her, you just couldn't help it. Her twin was a bit more withdrawn, his talents and interests being in computers, words, and logic. He started learning to hack not long after they started school. A real wiz kid, he was. Anyway…"

He paused a moment as his expression turned to one of bitterness. The whole group leaned in, waiting for him to continue.

"Well, these twins were always together, almost seeming to be two parts of one whole, superior being of some sort. Too good to be true, right? Their mom ended up being a witch. Her powers awakened right in front of them, and they were destructive. The girl's powers answered, healing some of the damage, but the boy, he was pretty traumatized by the whole thing. Both of them grew away from their mom. They were twelve or thirteen at that time. They really became anchors for each other, though the boy feared the awakening of his powers, not wanting to harm his sister, or anyone else. He didn't even think of her as a witch.

"Some time passed, with things with their mom getting worse all the time. Then something happened when they were sixteen, and their mom went nuts. This drew the attention of the witch hunters. They stormed the house at night, killing the mom. The boy somehow escaped, but he found his sister's room empty, with blood spread everywhere. Her body was never found." Nagira stopped then, covering his face with his hands once more, weariness showing in the slump of his shoulders.

"Well?" prodded Robin. "What happened to the boy?"

"He became a witch hunter…" he mumbled from behind his hands. "He basically died with his twin. That boy doesn't exist anymore."

No one spoke for a long time, not knowing what to say. Perhaps there was nothing to say. Eventually, Nagira stood.

"I guess we'd better check it out, huh? We owe it to that family not to just let this cult thing stay in their house." He walked out, and looked around. As he expected, Amon was nowhere to be found. He decided they'd all be better off leaving him out of the whole thing as much as possible.

_Two hours later…_

Karasuma and Sakaki walked arm in arm along a residential street. They casually stopped in front of a certain house. Miho's eyes widened as she took in the scene.

Robin, borrowing Nagira's binoculars, focused in on the pair, walking as though they were just some lovers out for a stroll. She was sitting in a car, parked in front of another house about a block away. When she saw them hesitate, she shifted her view to the driveway and gasped.

There, kneeling on the concrete, was a child of about four. She was dressed in a simple white sundress, her fine black hair tied back with a pink ribbon. She was covered with multicolored chalk dust. She could have been any little girl, if not for the designs she was putting all over the front of the house.

Every one of the symbols were wardings, against entrance and evil. As the watchers stood transfixed, she put on the finishing touches, whispered a few words, and retreated behind the invisible barrier. Then she looked up, meeting the eyes of all three of the hunters. Her eyes were the same raven black as her hair, and in her fair face seemed much too large and wise. She seemed to know exactly why they were there, along with every sin any one of them had ever committed. Her sober expression did not change, though, and she turned and walked into the house, closing the door and locking it.

Haruto shuddered off the chill the child's eyes had caused, and started guiding Miho away from the house, a bit faster than they had come. She was still watching the house, her face troubled. All the shutters were closed tightly, and the roof needed some serious attention, along with the paint. It did not look like anyone was living there at all, but for the chalk all over the front yard, the grass of which had run wild.

"What on earth would a little girl be doing there, and why was she putting shields up around the place?" Miho muttered to him. "And those eyes… what was it about her eyes that seemed familiar?" Their eyes met and if either of them had any idea, they did not speak of it.

_"Well, that was weird. You guys see anything other than the kid?" _Michael's voice came through their communicators. As they got in the car with Robin and an oddly silent Nagira, they turned on the visual to find him shoving popcorn into his mouth. _"So, what do we do now?"_

"Well, looks to me like we're gonna have to just raid the place." Haruto shrugged. "We definitely have to have Robin do something about the barrier, and we need all the manpower we can get, not knowing how many witches there are in there."

"We should probably get it over with as soon as possible," said Robin. "That girl probably realized what we're doing, and if she did, we can't give them time to prepare. Those wards were not made by a beginner, and who knows how strong the others are."

_"Is Amon going to be up to this? He seemed pretty weirded-out just from the address."_

"He'll do it." Nagira straightened out of his slump and started the car. "He wouldn't want anyone in that house, especially not a bunch of witches."

_"Alright, then. Is it on for tonight?"_

The group nodded.


	4. Chapter 3: Awakening

POST-SERIES

Amon and Robin somehow escape from the Factory, under very strange circumstances. But then, some of Amon's past begins to come out as a mysterious witch, called the Angel, falls into the STN-J's crosshairs...

Nature's Folly

WARNING: POST-SERIES

((NOTE: I do NOT own Witch Hunter Robin, or any characters from it. I'm not making a profit off this, so don't sue me. Lastly, if any of the religious or sexual topics (If you want me to be specific (which would spoil quite a bit of the story) email me.) involved in this insult you, don't send me hate mail. This is called ART, children, and therefore I am free to make it as I see fit. Any suggestions, please send to and please state the subject, or it might be deleted. Thankees much! Fluffy-sama))

Chapter 3: Awakening

_Ghosts,_ thought Amon as he loaded his gun. _Has to be ghosts. No one has been in that house. _

"Damnit!" he yelled as he dropped the cartridge for the umpteenth time. Nagira jumped at his sudden explosion. "My hands are shaking. Why are my hands shaking?"

"You don't have to do this, you know." Nagira eyed his brother. "You already look like hell. Do you really want to go back in that house? Having all those memories tossed in your face isn't going to do you any good."

Amon started to pace. "There was a little girl in the front yard, and she looked like her. Am I supposed to just ignore that? It's impossible, but if you all saw her… but she's dead! There was way too much blood for her to have lived. The damn reports said there was music coming from the attic. Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. She loved that piece. Who the hell could possibly know enough about Angel to find the house, get in her room, and play her favorite music?"

"As in who else besides you, right Amon?" He took the gun and loaded it himself. "She had fans, you know. Maybe if some witch found out where you guys lived and took over the house when she died. Maybe if they had the power to make someone look like her…"

"There are too many 'if's to be sure of anything." He sighed as he sat down next to Nagira and strapped on the gun. After a long moment of silence, they both stood and walked to the door, pulling on their coats. "Whoever it is, they are going to regret defiling that house."

_Later…_

Robin knelt at the end of the driveway and looked up at the signs drawn all over the cracked concrete. Behind her stood the other Hunters, all waiting for her to clear the way. Suddenly, she stood and walked up to the edge of the invisible barrier, extending a hand out cautiously. As her hand reached over the wardings, it met resistance, like a rubber band made of air, trying to push her away. The marks glowed palely in the darkness. Withdrawing her hand, she turned to her companions.

"It looks like I'll have to burn through, but the backlash will surely give us away. We'll have to move fast once the barrier is down. Are you ready?" At their nods, she faced the house and put on her glasses. Squinting, she set a spark at the edge, expanding it as it caught onto the stored power. With a spreading effect like paper burning, the spot of flame became a ring, pushing outward, and then curving around, following the dome-like barrier. As it burned off, they moved in toward the door, Robin sweating just a bit from the effort. Standing on either side of the door, the group waited for Amon's signal.

But before he and Haruto kicked the door in, he paused, closing his eyes and taking a slow, deep breath. And then the door was down, and the Hunters entered the house in a cloud of dust. Every finger on a trigger quivered, every eye searched the darkness, anticipating an attack.

No attack came, and for all that could be seen on the first floor, no one had been anywhere but from the door to the stairway in a very long time. There was furniture covered with cloths that had once been white, and a thick layer of dust covered everything but a slightly clearer path leading to the second floor. No signs of life were in the small front room, kitchen, or dining room. Silently, Amon led the way upstairs, gun at the ready.

At the top of the stairs, the path remained straight down a narrow hallway, but they checked behind every door anyway, finding only two bedrooms, a bathroom, and an office, all in similar states of neglect. At the end of the hall, another, smaller stairway spiraled upward. Slowly, Amon climbed these as well, now raising his gun. In the silence, all the Hunters were beginning to quiver. An unsteady, golden light was coming from above. With a slight pause to prepare, they all rushed up the last few steps, into the attic.

This room was clean, and there was a slight scent of lavender and candle wax. On one end of the room was a loft bed under an open window, with a desk under the bed. Lining the sloping ceiling/walls were shelves of books and pictures pinned up, but the light was too dim to see them clearly. At the other end, a gleaming black grand piano and some other instruments in cases stood, with some candles placed around them on some more shelves. Atop the closed piano lay a figure all in black. The form did not stir as they approached, did not even seem to be breathing.

"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?" yelled Amon, stepping a bit closer with his gun leveled. Now the creature moved, reaching one thin, white arm to cover its head.

"Leave me alone…" choked out a raw voice. A female voice? "This is _my_ house. If you're here to steal, go now before I hurt you. If you're here for me, I don't want to see you. I'm dead. Leave me alone…"

"Are you a witch? And if you're dead, why are you here?" demanded Miho, even as Amon faltered.

"I was, and I don't know. Maybe this is hell."

Amon put his gun away and walked up to the piano, shaking so much he had to steady himself against it. He bent close to her, and whispered in a hoarse voice, "Angel?"

The woman flinched, as if he had struck her. Her arm moved once more, and she pushed her long, matted black hair out of her face, looking at Amon upside-down. She blinked her dark eyes once, slowly. "Get out of my head. Let me forget you. You're as dead as I am. I don't want to see things right now." She curled in on herself.

"Angel!" he cried, grabbing her hand. "Angel, I'm alive! So are you. But where have you been?"

"Oh, God… I can feel you now. I'm mad and dead." She was starting to cry, pulling away. Now Nagira began to move closer, as the others stared, shocked and baffled, with their weapons still in hand.

Amon held onto her hand, and brought her closer, gathering her into his arms and sitting on the bench next to the piano. With his other hand, he gently brushed her hair away from her face. Brushing his fingers across her cheek, he gazed at her eyes, searching for answers to old questions. "They did not kill you, but what did they do instead?"

"They were Hunters. They took me to some new place they called the Factory…"


	5. Chapter 4: Confessions

POST-SERIES

Amon and Robin somehow escape from the Factory, under very strange circumstances. But then, some of Amon's past begins to come out as a mysterious witch, called the Angel, falls into the STN-J's crosshairs...

Nature's Folly

WARNING: POST-SERIES

((NOTE: I do NOT own Witch Hunter Robin, or any characters from it. I'm not making a profit off this, so don't sue me. Lastly, if any of the religious or sexual topics (If you want me to be specific (which would spoil quite a bit of the story) email me.) involved in this insult you, don't send me hate mail. This is called ART, children, and therefore I am free to make it as I see fit. Any suggestions, please send to and please state the subject, or it might be deleted. Thankees much! Fluffy-sama))

Chapter 4: Confessions

The Hunters stared at Angel as she laid her head against Amon's chest. Her brows drew together after a moment.

"I can hear your heart… you are alive!" With a sob, she threw her arms around his neck, and they clung together, shaking. She held him tight, like a dream that might vanish if she let go. He cradled her like a fragile treasure, as if she might break, and buried his face in her hair. They seemed to have forgotten all about the others in the room.

Just when Nagira was ready to interrupt, Angel sat up. "What's poking me?" She reached down and pulled out his gun. Her smile vanished, and her eyes widened. "Amon…? Why do you… NO! You wouldn't!" She jumped up and looked at each of the Hunters. "You," she pointed at Robin, "you were there! In the factory… with Amon?" She looked back at him, then turned toward Nagira and stared. Nagira half-smiled at her. "Oniichan?"

He nodded. She looked down at the gun in his hand. "You're Hunters… You're all Hunters! Why, Amon? You thought I was dead, so you joined the people that killed me?"

"No!" He stood now, and his hands fisted at his sides. "They told me a witch killed you. They said they would help me avenge you!"

"And you believed them over me? I told you not to ever let them find you. I warned you that they might try to take you because you're untrained! How long did it take for them to have you wrapped around their fingers? A week? Or maybe it was a day. Was it that same day? I held them up for an hour or so before I weakened. Ah, yes. How many witches have you killed? How many did you send to Hell, hm? Hundreds, I would guess. Your powers are like mine; perfect for killing. You could smell their blood, feel it slow when your cursed bullets hit their hearts-"

"Stop it, Angel. You know better than that." Nagira covered her mouth gently with his hand as Amon stared, pain and utter disbelief in his eyes. Angel's eyes, the same obsidian black as her twin's, turned on her half-brother. And, for the first time that anyone had seen, they were _cold_. Nagira flinched at that icy glare, and said, still gentle, "What could they possibly have done to you that would make you turn on him like that?"

She wrested her chin out of his grasp. "What did they do to him that he would hunt others like me, like himself?" She looked at Amon now, boring holes in him with her eyes.

"They killed what he loved most… and said it was witches that did it. Said it was your mother's fault. What choice did he have? If he had not become a Hunter, he would have been Hunted. Sent to the factory, like you."

"How _did_ you get out of the Factory?" asked Haruto, who had been hanging in the background.

"And why would Amon have been Hunted?" said Robin. "I was sure I had put all of the witches there out of their pain, and Amon isn't a Craft-user, or a witch."

Now Amon looked away. "Yet… my powers are dormant."

"I was sent to the Factory when I was too weak to withstand the bullets. It wasn't the orbo that finished me: it was not developed very well then. I was weak from healing the damage. I do not hurt people, with my powers or not. I had only hoped that Amon would get away, since I was surrounded. They ran tests on me and found that no matter what they did, they could not pull blood from me, make orbo from me, or kill me. Instead, they tossed me down into this pit where they stored the waste from making orbo, and left me there." She pulled away and sat by her piano, trailing her fingers over it, her eyes unfocused and her mind somewhere far away, and frightening.

"What they didn't know was that the wastes had residual powers in them, and these affected my powers over time. And time… that's all there was, and even that was indistinct. After they closed me up, there was no light. When I couldn't talk or sing to myself anymore, no sound. When I didn't care anymore, no movement. Nothing but darkness." She placed her left hand on the piano keys and began to play a slow waltz. Just three notes, one after another at first, with a low undertone beneath them, and then a key change and the intensity grew, then resolved. She smiled and closed her haunted eyes, lost in the sorrowful, yet joyous sonata. "Time stopped, and still I changed."

Her right hand moved now, a few little, almost playful trills and grace notes. She rocked slowly, and now her tears flowed as well. Strange, bloody tears wrung from the weary heart of a caged bird, singing her mournful song to the bright world that was lost to her. Under her breath, she querulously hummed along with her hands, and the piano cried with her. As she leaned closer and closer to her beloved instrument, the notes weakened and faded.

"I became stronger," she continued. Her voice was soft, as the music erratically increased in volume and tempo, transforming into another Beethoven; Appassionata. Her voice followed its crescendo. "But what good did it do? I was dead, the world I knew was dead, and all I was good for was to become compost for the earth that could not reach me through the concrete. But then the concrete broke!" Her fingers were flying over the keys.

"The ground shook, and I could hear the cries of the witches above me, they were crying for their Eve. 'Eve of angels, save us from our pain!' they said, over and over, like a prayer. And then it all stopped, and the ceiling fell in." Her voice softened, and the music faded. "Among the rubble were two, and I smelt their blood, their pain. It called to me, the broken flesh to the healer. And heal I did. My dreamlike ignorance was gone, and I wanted desperately to see the sky, feel the sun on my skin, taste the life all around. So I used these new powers of mine to change myself so I could escape. I had transformed myself before, but only into things that already existed. A bird to watch over my brothers, a dog to sit by their sides, or a cat to go out at night to find people who needed me. But for this, no normal creature could do what I was going to try. I combined the flesh of the animals into myself. A body like an elephant's, but upright like an ape, and with claws like a bear. And then I dug. All I knew was that I had to go out, and then up. Who knows how long I was digging for? An hour, a day, a week, what did it matter?

"But when I broke through, there was no sun. Only darkness and thick fog awaited me. And as I looked back at the rubble that had been my prison, that was when I knew I was dead, only a spirit, left behind to drift and watch the world whirl by, groveling in the dust of its passing." Her voice dropped away, and she lay her head against the piano once more, her hands barely touching the keys as she seamlessly slid back into the Moonlight, despite the different key and character. Amon had somehow ended up at the open window, and there he stared out, not seeing the rooftops around the house, or the stars in the inky blackness of the sky. Instead, his face was relaxed, serene, with only his unfocused eyes belying the mask. Beneath the dark of those orbs was an inner bitterness. No, not bitterness, but horror.

His gaze slid slowly to a shelf nearby. Now his eyes caught on a down turned picture frame. His hand suddenly shot out, causing the others to jolt, but for the figure collapsed at the piano. At some point they had all settled, enthralled by the flow of music and words. Robin sat on the bottom rung of the ladder going up to the loft bed, Yurika at the desk, and Miho in a plush chair that showed the abuse of much sprawling on for reading. Nagira leaned against the wall by the stairs, and Haruto did the same near Miho. They all watched as Amon reached for the picture and set it upright.


	6. Chapter 5: Memories

POST-SERIES

Amon and Robin somehow escape from the Factory, under very strange circumstances. But then, some of Amon's past begins to come out as a mysterious witch, called the Angel, falls into the STN-J's crosshairs...

Nature's Folly

WARNING: POST-SERIES

((NOTE: I do NOT own Witch Hunter Robin, or any characters from it. I'm not making a profit off this, so don't sue me. Lastly, if any of the religious or sexual topics (If you want me to be specific (which would spoil quite a bit of the story) email me.) involved in this insult you, don't send me hate mail. This is called ART, children, and therefore I am free to make it as I see fit. Any suggestions, please send to and please state the subject, or it might be deleted. Thankees much! Fluffy-sama))

Chapter 5: Memories

In the photo he held were two kids, a boy and a girl, who were probably about fourteen, with their arms around each others' waists, and both were grinning like idiots. They wore school uniforms, and the girl was pulling at her skirt. They both had dark eyes and hair, the girl's down to the middle of her back and the boy's was long enough to hang in his eyes and fall over his collar a bit.

Amon sighed and turned towards his sister, wrapping his arms about her shoulders and resting his cheek against her hair. "I don't expect you to believe me," he murmured. "After you tossed me out the window, I ran, but I knew I wouldn't get to Nagira's, so instead I went to Touko's. Her mother opened the door and sat me down in there, and she called Zaizen. He showed up in a few minutes and informed me that the police had found Mom, and that you probably were dead too, but that the witches had escaped and taken your body to do who-knows-what with it. He was kind to me, and he told me he would teach me to hunt the witches that did that to you." He paused, as Angel slowly turned her head into his shoulder. Her eyes had regained some of their focus. She pulled her hands away from the piano and drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them as Amon continued.

"I thought he meant I was going to be a cop, and I thought it would be perfect. I quit school, since he said to and they really couldn't teach me anything else anyway. He shipped me off to some training camp in Europe, and I learned to shoot a gun, track movement, and everything else I would need to be a Hunter. By the time I realized that I was going to be a Hunter, I didn't care. I didn't remember you as a witch, and I saw no good in the ones I Hunted. So Hunt I did, without ever really thinking about it. Then came Robin to stir up all kinds of questions…" He opened his eyes and raised them to look at the girl, still speaking to his sister. "She reminded me of you, all quiet and full of secrets I didn't deserve to know. And just when I thought I was beginning to understand her, Zaizen orders me to Hunt her, to kill her.

"But I just couldn't. Every time I tried, at the last minute I would realize I was shooting at a person, not just a witch. So in the end, Headquarters took over the STN-J, and I sent Robin to Nagira, and went into hiding. As I watched from a distance, I realized that Zaizen and his Factory project were in trouble with Headquarters. So after we all got back together, we went to the Factory to confront him. Robin and I got caught when the whole thing self-destructed, and I assume the floor cracked and we fell through into the room where you had been kept, but no one was there when we regained consciousness."

The other Hunters continued to watch in silence, but Amon spoke no more, his eyes now closed. Nobody moved for a few long moments, until Michael's voice came through their communicators. _"So, what do we do now?"_

They all looked at each other, then at Amon. "It's really up to you," said Miho from the chair.

His eyebrows drew together, but his eyes remained closed. "No, it's not," he said. "What we do depends on whether Angel can forgive me or not."

Angel said nothing for a while, then she slowly turned towards her brother, who released her and they looked into each other's eyes, one pair carefully neutral, the other swimming with conflicting emotions. "I refuse to help you kill innocent people, nor will I cause any harm to anyone." She took a deep breath. Trailing her fingers over the keys, she continued, "I can't just leave my things here, either. I must stay, bad memories or no."

Amon's face began to brighten a bit. "I… well, I could never ask you to be a Hunter, but I think as long as Headquarters doesn't know who or what you are, they probably wont ask questions. I could just move back here, since Nagira still owns the house. Maybe you could be a sort of healer for us, when people get hurt we can bring them to you. What do you say?"

She looked away and chewed her lip, a faint line appearing between her brows. After a few moments, she nodded slowly. Looking back up and searching the faces of the others in the room, she nodded again, with more confidence. "it seems to be the best choice. So long as you keep me out of direct involvement, my conscience should remain clear and my identity secret."


End file.
